


The Breaking Point

by AOO



Category: Ylvis
Genre: Danger, Family Drama, Friendship, Gen, Hurt, Sibling conflict
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-15
Updated: 2013-11-22
Packaged: 2018-01-01 14:49:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1045198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AOO/pseuds/AOO
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bård and Vegard start out the day at each other's throats, but then a crisis changes everything.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Ok, well, obviously this is fiction. I haven't really tried my hand at writing fiction before, so I guess I'd be interested in some feedback. I was having trouble deciding on the perspective for this story and I've decided to kind of play with the perspective a bit. Therefore, one thing I'd like to know is if you have any trouble understanding who is speaking or thinking. I'm sure I've made a lot of rooky mistakes, but I hope you enjoy it. 
> 
> I'll probably get the second chapter up pretty soon.

“Why do you always have to control everything?” Bård was standing in front of Vegard’s desk practically shouting. He looked a little disheveled as if he’d woken up late for work, which he had.

Vegard wasn’t sure how this had turned into an argument, but it had been going on for a few minutes now. “Well, someone had to make the decision while you were sleeping in this morning.”

Bård put his hands on the desk and leaned in, “I wasn’t ‘sleeping in’”, he said, this time keeping his voice down. “I told you, Nora was sick last night. I was up with her every hour or two until 5am when she finally fell asleep.”

“Look, I understand that things come up when you have kids, but this is our job. You could have at least called. You should know that.” Vegard looked down at some papers on his desk, trying to indicate that the discussion was over.

“Being late isn’t really the issue. I want to know why you made those decisions without me.” Bård stood and backed away from the desk a bit.

“Of course it’s the issue.” Vegard rolled his eyes. “Look, we had to make some choices by 9am so that other people could do their jobs and get things ready **_on time_** for us. For example, they wanted to know who was going to need the watersuit, so I said I would do that challenge and you would do the other one."  He looked up into those blue eyes that he had looked into almost every day of his life. "If you had been here, we would have made those choices together." He was starting to realise that everyone in the _I kveld med Ylvis_ office could probably hear them. ”“Can’t we just be done with this?”

“Oh, and an extra forty-five minutes or an hour would have made a big difference? I think you just did it because you like to be in control.” Bård was glaring at him with his arms crossed.

Leaning back in his chair, Vegard met his gaze. “Now you’re being irrational. Just be on time next time.”

“I am usually here on time, aren’t I? I don’t know why you’re making such a big deal about this one time.” Bård looked really exasperated. “And besides, you were late just last week.”

“Which proves my point, I called and let the office know I’d be late. That’s what adults do, Bård.” That last sentence really just slipped out of Vegard’s mouth. As soon as he said it he wished he could just reach out and grab the words and stuff them back in his mouth before they reached Bård’s ears.

There was a look that flashed across Bård’s face that Vegard hadn’t seen for a long time. “What the fuck, Vegard? I’m a little late and you get to take over! Is that the way our partnership works? God!! Sometimes you’re such a…”

Vegard couldn’t hear the rest of that sentence over the slamming of his office door. He tried to get in one last word, but he was pretty sure Bård couldn’t hear that either. He really wanted to punch a hole in the wall, but he didn’t want to deal with getting maintenance to come in and fix it, so instead he sat at his desk trying to figure out what had just happened.

 

* * *

 

The rest of the morning Vegard made a point of avoiding Bård, which was easier than it should have been in their small office. Apparently, Bård was avoiding him as well. Having overheard the unprecedented blow up between the brothers, the rest of the staff tried to give each of them some space. This resulted in everyone talking in hushed tones and a general feeling of awkwardness. So, as soon as they could reasonably leave for lunch, everyone took off.

Everyone that is, except for Bård and Vegard, and their buddy, Calle. Calle was sure that once the office emptied out, one of the brothers would make an attempt at smoothing things over. It was a little surprising that it hadn’t happened already. Having known them since back when they were all in school together, he’d always admired their closeness as brothers and their inability to hold a grudge.

Calle never ate much for lunch anyway, so he just grabbed some fruit out of the break room and ate it in his own office. As he walked to and from the break room, he noticed that both brothers were focused on their computers, but they appeared to be brooding more than working. Bård was wearing that old grey v-neck sweater of his that he always seemed to wear when he was particularly tired or maybe coming down with a cold. Calle thought he always looked a lot younger in that sweater, probably because it was a little big on him and had a hole in one of the elbows.

The lunch hour passed without either of them leaving their offices, much less talking to each other. Normally, Calle wouldn’t get in the middle of their relationship. Well, never really. But now that lunch time was ending and there was still no sign of a thaw in the frosty mood, he felt like he needed to say something. Calle was very close to both brothers but, having recognized that Bård might not be feeling well today, decided to talk to Vegard. He knocked on Vegard’s doorway and when there was no response, he went in and sat down in the chair next to Vegard’s desk. “What’s wrong with you two today?”

“Sometimes he’s impossible to talk to.” Vegard kept his eyes on his computer screen. “He came in late today and then he had the nerve to get mad at me about decisions that were made without him!” Recounting their argument was making Vegard feel irritated again. “What did he expect? We couldn’t put everything on hold until he decided to get here!” Calle tried to get a word in, but Vegard was on a roll. “And then he started talking about how I always want to take charge of everything, like I’m the control freak! I told him if he was going to be irrational he could just fuck off!!"

Calle was surprised by how angry Vegard still seemed to be, going from zero to sixty in two seconds flat. He sat for a minute and let Vegard’s words dissipate before he said quietly,“Is that how you feel when I’m late? I’ve never felt like you were that mad at me.”

Vegard took a deep breath and broke his gaze with his computer screen to look at Calle for what was probably the first time in their conversation. “No. Well...no. I don’t know, I guess I’m kind of used to you being late.” Vegard paused. Calle was late quite often, much more often than Bård. “But you don’t show up late and then start arguments with me...and...” He really couldn’t think of a good explanation as to why he had argued with Bård today, especially not today when Bård was so obviously tired. “and...you’re just so easy to get along with.”

“Well I don’t get it.” said Calle, keeping his voice low. “Bård’s easy to get along with, you say that all the time.” He waited for Vegard to disagree before he continued. “This isn’t like you two to let something like this get so overblown and the office feels weird with you two fighting. Maybe you should go talk to him.”

Vegard sighed. He knew Calle was probably right. He’d been sitting at his desk, trying to work for hours without typing a single word. He kept thinking about the look in Bård’s eyes right before he stormed off. _I really didn’t mean to say... well, any of that._ “I...I’ll talk to him right after we do our taping outside. I think we need to get down there pretty soon.”

 

* * *

 

A few weeks ago the idea had come up to do a _Hvem kan slå Ylvis_ rematch against one of the former contestants on the show. Thomas was their first choice, and it turned out he was willing and available. Outside the studio, a crew had been working all day to set up the first challenge. Two white forty foot ladders were standing straight up and each had a gangplank attached to it at the top. The gangplanks were sticking out six feet or so and connected to a thirty-six foot catwalk with guardrails to create a long walkway from one ladder to the other. Cranes had been brought in to support the catwalk.

Vegard went to the dressing room to change into the red “Team Ylvis” athletic wear that they had gotten specifically for these challenges. He had hoped that maybe he’d have a couple of minutes alone with Bård so they could talk. But it was apparent that he had already come down and changed, as his clothes from this morning were lying in a pile over on his side of the room. That really wasn’t like Bård, he had a thing about wrinkles. Vegard always liked to tease him about that.

Outside there was a lot of activity, with people completing last minute preparations for the taping. He looked up at the ladders, they looked a lot taller than he had imagined. It made him feel a little sick to his stomach when he thought about Bård having to climb them. The gangplanks sticking out from the ladders also looked longer than he had thought they’d agreed upon. There were no railings on the gangplanks, but of course there would be safety harnesses. More of a psychological danger than physical, he reassured himself.

There were a few things that Bård wouldn’t do, but he usually liked to push himself past the fear if he could. Vegard was having second thoughts about whether Bård would want to do this challenge, but he was pretty sure that there was no way his brother would confide in him now. His stomach fell a little further.

Bård and Thomas already had their helmets on, Bård dressed in red and Thomas in blue. Calle had also changed into his black dress suit and was ready to perform his duties as the moderator of the events and the somewhat impartial third party. An assistant appeared to be instructing them as to how everything would work. She noticed Vegard and signaled him to come over so they could begin. He knew, as he walked to his mark, that he probably wouldn’t get much of a response , but when he reached his brother’s side he said quietly, “Are you ok with this?” Bård didn’t answer right away, then he nodded and said “Yes”, but never really met his eyes.

As the filming began, Vegard could hear Calle reading the instructions, but found it difficult to pay attention. “...climb to the top, walk the gangplank and clip yourself onto the safety rope for the catwalk before you unhook the safety rope you have for the ladder…” He glanced at Bård to try and get a read on his mood. “ ...when you get to the middle you’ll have to move your clip…” Vegard just hoped Bård didn’t feel as distracted as he felt right now. “ first person down the other side wins.”

It was time to step back and let the other two race. Vegard wasn’t sure if Bård would even shake his hand right now, so he patted him on the back and said, “Good luck.”

Vegard heard “Go” before he had reached his second mark. He turned around and saw Bård near the right ladder and Thomas heading to the left ladder, each of them climbing onto the three foot tall platform that surrounded the base of their ladder. As Bård jumped up on the platform in one fluid motion, it reminded Vegard of how agile his brother was ...and how very competitive he could be.

Both men were climbing the ladders quickly with Thomas just a bit ahead of Bård. Vegard was starting to relax for the first time since this morning. He began to get caught up in the competition, yelling up encouragement to Bård, “Go Ylvisåker, Go!”

Upon reaching the top of their ladders they each crossed the gangplanks without much hesitation. They paused to fasten themselves to the safety ropes that were attached to the catwalk. Most of the staff was now cheering for the racers. Vegard heard a few of them cheering for Thomas, so he started cheering a bit louder for Bård.

The crew from the studio’s workshop had added a sort of handrail on one side of the catwalk so the racers could pull their tethers along without the interruption of a support every 6 feet. However, the span was long enough that there needed to be a support for the rail at the halfway point. This meant that they would have to unclip the carabiner briefly and reclip it on the other side of the center support. Thomas got to the center of the catwalk first.

Vegard watched as Thomas moved his carabiner from one side of the rail to the other. Arriving second, Bård unhooked his carabiner and moved carefully behind Thomas. Before either of them started racing again there was a piercing sound and the catwalk jerked, and then Vegard saw someone falling.


	2. Chapter 2

**_Forty-five minutes ago..._**  
  
Bård had easily heard most of Vegard’s rant through the glass that divided their offices. _I can’t believe him, dragging Calle into this!_ He hadn’t heard Calle’s side of the conversation but he felt like Calle must be taking Vegard’s side. Over the years he had come to think of Calle as one of his closest friends and not just as his big brother’s friend, but occasionally he still felt like Calle had a stronger allegiance to Vegard.

He had been mulling over his fight with Vegard for a few hours now. _Where does he get off saying that stuff to me? Why can’t he just have my back? He’s got everyone else’s back, all the time. But instead he has to make me feel like shit for such a small thing._

His thoughts were interrupted by one of the staff saying “Bård, I think you need to get changed and go outside for the first event. You know we are taping it ahead of time so that we have better sunlight.”

“Yes. Ok, thanks.” he responded trying not to sound as irritated as he felt. He looked over his shoulder into Vegard’s office. Vegard and Calle were still talking. _This might be a good time to go change my clothes. I’d rather not see Vegard if I don’t have to._

Down in the dressing room, his “Team Ylvis” athletic wear was waiting for him. As he changed he couldn’t stop thinking about how Vegard had treated him. This _Hvem kan slå Ylvis_ rematch had sounded like fun a few weeks ago when it first came up. Now it was just another source of irritation because Vegard had already decided - among other things - which challenges they each were going to do. He hurried out of the dressing room, just wanting to get it over with.

When he stepped outside, his eyes were drawn to the ladders. Like everyone else who first saw them, his gaze followed the ladders up and up to the catwalk at the top. It was a rather imposing sight. Bård noticed Thomas chatting with their producer and, making a real effort to hide his mood, he went over to greet him . After so many years of performing day in and day out you get pretty good at slapping on a fake, but relatively believable, smile if need be.

After a while Bård was handed a helmet and one of their interns helped him get into his climbing harness. He looked over and saw his brother looking up at the ladders. Calle came over and the producer introduced him to Thomas. He shook Thomas’ hand and then he leaned over and gave Bård a hug. He only said “Hey, Bård”, but he gave an extra squeeze before letting go, like he wanted Bård to know it was genuine. He heard their assistant call Vegard over to start the shoot. _I suppose now we get to chat on camera about how we decided which one of us would do this challenge. I wonder if I should say that I had no choice._ Bård decided against that and tried to control his expression as Vegard took a spot by his side.

He was a little surprised to hear “Are you ok with this?” as his brother took his place next to him. What difference does it make now? was his first thought. But noticing the tone of Vegard’s voice, and that the question was sincere and… maybe a bit protective, he simply said, ”Yes.”

Then, almost immediately, they were taping. Calle simply said, “Bård, you’ll be doing this challenge right?” Bård confirmed it and Calle began reading the instructions. Bård turned his attention to the rules. He didn't want to lose the race on a stupid technicality.

Bård ran through the instructions a few times in his head. _Ok, up the ladder, across the catwalk, and down the other side. Remember to hook and unhook the safety ropes as I move through. And don’t look down. Easy._ He felt Vegard pat him on the back and heard “Good luck.” Somewhat against his will, it felt really good to have that contact with Vegard after being mad at him all day. _Well, at least he didn’t skip wishing me good luck._ The thought lessened Bård's irritation with Vegard just a little bit. But quickly his thoughts returned to the contest.

At the shout of “Go”, he and Thomas were racing towards their separate ladders. He jumped up on the platform and found the carabiner to clip to his harness. He felt like he was moving quickly, but when he started climbing the ladder he looked over and Thomas was a rung or two ahead of him. As he climbed higher he could hear Vegard start to encourage him from below.

The ladders had looked very tall from below, but from this vantage point they seemed much higher. Getting onto the gangplank was easy, being on gangplank was kind of spooky. It was just long enough that you were acutely aware of walking away from anything to hang on to. He tried to only focus on what he needed to do next. It’s all pretty safe, he kept telling himself.

As he was clipping himself to the catwalk rail he began hearing more of their staff cheering. Some of them were cheering for Thomas, which was probably only fair since Thomas’ family wasn’t going to be there until later when they started taping the rest of the show. Still, he was trying to recognized voices and figure out who was cheering against him. He might have to plot some revenge for the traitors in his office. The thought of a little office hijinks put a bit of a smile on his face.

Racing across the platform, he saw Thomas reach the center first. He unhooked his carabiner and started moving around Thomas’ back. He was grateful that Thomas had stopped moving as he was passing behind him. A little relieved, he reached out to clip himself to the rail.

The snapping of the cable made a painfully sharp sound, a loud crack, which penetrated Bård’s concentration and suddenly everything seemed to be moving in slow motion. A hundred thoughts ran through his head before he even felt the platform move and then a hundred more before the bottom dropped out from under him. With the first jolt he could feel that his heels were now lower than his toes and then he was just falling.

Bård reached out to grab whatever he could. Totally missing the top rail, he felt the lower rail pass through his grasp and then his hands were running over the open weave of what had just been the floor beneath him. It was all slipping by so fast, and yet his brain was slowing it down so that he was experiencing every moment in great detail. As he reached the last of the metal flooring he managed to grab a rail on the outside edge of the floor...with one hand.

 

* * *

 

The noise...the movement of the catwalk...and then the dropping of one side of the catwalk happened so fast that it was hard for Vegard to process at first. What was really happening was all too clear when he saw someone falling from the platform, a vision that could only be described as terrifying. But then the safety rope kicked in and they were hanging about 20 feet from the ground. Vegard felt a little relieved, but then he came to realize that it was Thomas who was hanging on his safety rope. _Wait, where’s Bård?_ Seeing Thomas falling had drawn his attention away from the platform. Now he could see Bård … hanging from the catwalk... with just one hand.

Vegard somehow found himself running toward the ladders. There was no plan, all he knew was that he had to get up to Bård. He looked up and yelled, “Hang on!” Even at that moment he realized that was kind of an obvious thing to say. On the other hand, what else was as important to say right now? When he looked up again, after jumping onto the platform, he saw that Bård had managed to get a second hand on the catwalk. “I’m coming, just hang on!” he shouted.

As he climbed the ladder, Vegard kept his eyes on Bård. The slight relief he had felt when he saw that Bård had gotten another hand up was quickly dissipating. He knew Bård was going to need something to change quickly if there was going to be any chance of getting him down safely. “Get your feet up! Pull your feet up!”

After a few seconds he saw Bård start to try to get his feet up. A couple of tries later he had gotten them up and was suspended from his feet as well as his hands.

As Vegard climbed past Thomas he said, “You should try to swing over and get on the ladder. That catwalk isn’t stable.”

“I’m afraid that if I start swinging it’ll make Bård fall.” Thomas replied.

“Let me try to get him then.” Somehow just hearing the words “it’ll make Bård fall” hit him like a two by four. He tried to shake that image out of his mind.

Nearing Bård he yelled, “Can you climb over towards me?” He climbed a few more rungs without any response so he yelled “Bård, climb over to this end. You’ve got to start moving over here.” The catwalk’s remaining cable was making some groaning noises that were making his stomach churn. Still, no response. “Bård, can you hear me?”

Bård was looking at the catwalk and trying to figure out how to move. He was really nervous about moving his hands, but even more so about moving his feet. It hadn’t been easy to get any kind of foothold in the first place.

“Bård, please, climb over here!” Vegard heard his own voice and wished that his last sentence hadn’t sounded so anxious. He wanted Bård to think that he was confident about getting him down. “Come on. I’m over here now. We gotta get you down.” He tried to sound somewhat composed and insistent at the same time. He was just happy his voice didn’t quaver.

“I’ll try” Bård finally said. It felt really difficult to talk when he was putting so much energy into just holding on.

Once he figured out how to reposition his feet so that he felt like he was supporting some of his body weight with at least one leg at all times, it didn’t take him too long to move to the edge of the catwalk.

“Good. Good. You’re doing a good job. Now you’re going to have to reach a hand over towards me so I can grab you.” Vegard couldn’t tell if Bård could hear him or understand what he was saying when he was getting no response. He wished he could at least see Bård’s eyes. They usually were so good at communicating, often knowing what each other was thinking by just looking at each other.

Bård was thinking the same thing. “I can’t see you,” he said. He was hanging upside down with his head toward the ladder that Vegard was on. Everytime Bård leaned his head back to look for Vegard, all he could see was the front of his own helmet. “Vegard, I can’t see you!” Vegard thought that he was beginning to sound a little panicked and tried to calm him down. “It’s ok. It’s going to be ok. I’m going to grab your hand.”

“But I can’t see you!!”, Bård repeated.

As Vegard was saying “It’s ok, ** _I_** can see **_you_** ”, Bård decided to take off the helmet. He quickly released his helmet and then got his hand back up on the rail. For a split second, Vegard thought Bård was falling. When he realized that it was only the helmet he started to say "Why’d you do that?" but he stopped himself. He felt better being able to see Bård’s eyes, he could only imagine how Bård must be feeling. “Ok. Ok. Now you can see me, too. That’s good. We’ll have to reach out and grab each other, alright?”

“Ok,” said Bård. It scared Vegard to hear Bård’s voice. He sounded so overwhelmed.

Reaching out as far as they could, Vegard could see that they were still at least two feet away from each other. _No, no, no! How am I going to reach him?_

“Just hang on, Bård. We’ll figure this out. It’s going to be ok.” Now that he could see Bård’s face, he could also see what Bård was thinking and feeling. He could see that Bård needed to be distracted so he just kept talking. “Just give me a second, Bård. Do you trust me?”

“Yeah.”

“Good, ‘cause you’re going to have to trust me, I’m not going to let you fall!”

“Ok...but what are we going to do?”

What **are** we going to do?, thought Vegard.


	3. Chapter 3

Calle saw the catwalk drop and watched as Thomas fell. Before he even saw Bård hanging from the catwalk, Vegard was running toward the ladder. Looking around he thought, where is the rescue equipment? Shouldn’t there be firetrucks and paramedics on hand? He looked back up at Bård. _Oh shit! This cannot be happening._

Glancing around he saw at least three of their staff members were on their phones calling for emergency assistance. Another staffer had just come out of the building and started screaming, “No, you weren’t supposed to start yet! The rescue vehicles aren’t here, they got stuck in traffic!” Having been in charge of safety for this event, she was now totally freaking out. Someone went over to try to calm her down.

Calle could see Vegard reaching out to grab Bård’s hand, but they were too far apart. Calle felt like he might throw up.

 

* * *

 

What **_are_** we going to do? thought Vegard.

“Hey”, shouted Thomas from below, “If I swing over to the ladder, I can try to pull the catwalk closer to you with the rope.”

Vegard paused. “Ok….good idea.” He hated this idea. Thomas’ words from before,  _it’ll make Bård fall,_   were still ringing in his ears, but they needed to try something. Bård’s arms had to be getting tired. “Hold on Bård, get a good grip.”

It was harder than Thomas had thought it would be to start swinging. The wait was excruciating for Vegard. He watched as Bård struggled to keep his grip while the precariously hanging catwalk was starting to sway along with Thomas’ movements. In the meantime Vegard kept talking to Bård . “We’re going to have you off this in a minute. It’s going to be ok.”

The movement of the catwalk began to noticeably get to Bård, and he started to glance down at the ground. “Look at me, Bård. Don’t look down. Focus on me.” Vegard fought to maintain his composure as he tried to talk Bård through this. He kept telling himself, Bård can’t know how scared I am.

When Thomas finally managed to get onto the ladder, he shouted, “Vegard! I’m going to pull it over now.” Vegard gave him a thumbs up and Thomas pulled the rope.

“Alright, ready Bård? Reach out towards me now.” Vegard leaned off the ladder as far as possible and reached out his arm. For the second time, Bård let go of the catwalk with one hand and tried to grab his brother’s hand. Their fingers brushed a couple of times, but they were still too far apart. Knowing Vegard so well, it was easy to see how upset he was at this. Even though Vegard managed to cover it up very quickly, Bård felt as though his chances were quickly slipping away.

Frantically, Vegard searched for a solution. The catwalk’s cable was groaning above them. There couldn’t be much more time. He could only think of one more option. Trying to sound sure of himself, he said, “You’re just going to have to let go with both hands, Bård. You’ll be able to reach out farther.”

Bård looked away trying to compose himself. He knew Vegard would catch him if he could get close enough, but what if he couldn’t? And what if he was too tired to hold onto Vegard? The fatigue of hanging on for so long was starting to wear on him. He kind of forgot that he hadn’t responded yet to Vegard.

“Bård, please...please you’ve gotta trust me. I’m going to catch you.“

Hoping that he might get a second chance, if he missed Vegard on the first try, Bård tried to secure his feet in the metalwork of the catwalk.

“Bård? Answer me!”

Bård looked back to Vegard. “Yes. I’m sorry, yes.” He took a deep breath and tried to visualize letting go and stretching out towards Vegard. As scared as he was, there was something about reaching for his big brother, and trusting Vegard to catch him, that felt familiar and calmed him. “Ok. Let’s do this.”

“Alright, I’ll lean out on two and you reach for me on three. One…...two…...three.” Even though he knew it was coming, Vegard's heart skipped a beat when he saw Bård let go. It seemed like an eternity, as he watched Bård’s arm coming toward him, before he was able to catch his wrist. He felt Bård’s fatigued hand grab his wrist in return.

Vegard immediately started leaning back to the ladder, pulling Bård and the catwalk closer to him. “Grab the ladder with your free arm and hold on tight!”

Bård did his best to comply but his arms were starting to shake. Once he had a hold on the ladder with his left hand, Vegard seized him securely around the chest.

“I’ve got you, now pull your feet out.”

 _I’m almost there. Just pull out my left foot….and now my right foot…...my right foot……...shit, it’s stuck!_ He had wedged his foot in as tightly as he could before letting go with his hands. Now, with the catwalk pulled over towards the ladder, it had changed the angle enough that he couldn’t pull his foot out. _Shit…..Shit…..SHIT I’m stuck!_ “SHIT!!”

“Pull your feet out! Pull your feet out!” Vegard was almost shouting now, not understanding why Bård hadn’t already freed his feet. He was concerned that the catwalk was going to fall, so his attention was split between Bård’s feet and the increasingly groaning cable. “Bård! Pull your feet out!”

“I can’t!” moaned Bård “I’m stuck.” He struggled a bit more. He wondered if maybe there was some other way he could have secured his feet. “Maybe you should let go and we’ll try again.”

“There’s no fucking way I’m letting go, so you’d better pull your foot out before this whole thing falls!” Vegard couldn’t imagine releasing Bård, they’d worked so hard to get to this point.

Bård was straining to free his foot, talking between attempts, “You’d better let go… if it falls… I don’t want …...you to fall...” Bård was trying to free his foot with everything he had, pushing with his free leg to get some leverage. He was starting to feel as tired in his legs as his arms already did.

“I’m not letting go of you, so pull!!” Vegard finally recognized that he was yelling at Bård and that it obviously wasn’t helping. He could see that Bård was pulling as hard as he could. “Ok. Stop for a second. Instead of just pulling, try relaxing your foot out of your shoe while you pull.”

“Wha….uh… what?”

“Maybe, if you can get the shoe off, your foot will slip out.”

“I can’t.” Bård was breathing hard and close to giving up.

“You can! Come on, you can do this. Try to get out of the shoe.”

Feeling exhausted Bård tried to focus on freeing his foot from his shoe, almost more to appease Vegard than to free himself. Somehow, he managed wriggle his foot out of the shoe and pry his foot loose. Vegard had been holding him as tightly as he could but was a little surprised by the full weight of a falling Bård. He managed to hang on though and swung him so that he was facing the ladder.

For the first time since the cable broke Vegard felt like he could breathe. He had pulled Bård in front of himself, so that he was now standing behind Bård on the ladder. Instinctively, Bård leaned in to the ladder to make room for Vegard. After catching his breath for a few moments he asked Bård if he was ok. He heard a strained “yes”.

 _He’s got to be so tired. We’d better take this slow._ “Why don’t you shake your arms out? I’ll hold on to you.” Bård slowly let go, one arm at a time and shook them out. It felt comforting to have Vegard so close to him.

Vegard was in no hurry to move, but he was worried that Bård was still too rattled to climb down. “Bård, are you ok?” he asked again. He was so close to Bård that he was almost whispering. “Did you get hurt?”

Feeling a little dizzy, Bård was just trying to get his breathing back to normal. He had to force himself to answer, “I’m... I’m ok. I’m just kinda shaky.”

“We’ll wait until you’re ready.” Just then the second cable snapped, announced by another loud noise. Bård heard, “Put your head down,” and felt Vegard cover his head to protect him. The catwalk flashed by, and snapped cable whipped by their heads but fortunately it missed them. After a few seconds the catwalk hit the ground with a thunder that took Bård’s breath away.

No longer needing to shield Bård, Vegard backed off of him a bit. His heart was racing again. _That could have been Bård. That so could have been Bård on that catwalk. And it would have been my fault._ Even though Bård was right there in front of him, actually touching him, he felt the terror of what losing him would have been. He could only imagine the hole it would have left in his life.

After a while, Bård turned his head back to check on Vegard. “Are you ok? Nothing hit you, right?”

Bård's voice mercifully pulled him back from his thoughts. “I...I’m fine.”

“Oh, good! That was the longest you’d stopped talking since the first cable broke. I thought something was wrong.”

Vegard found himself snickering a bit at this, knowing how Bård always complained about his incessant talking. He leaned forward to see if Bård had actually made a joke and caught a bit of a smile on his brother’s face. “Oh, so that’s the thanks I get.” he said jokingly .

“No, I just kind of realized how it sounded after I said it.” He was chuckling as he spoke. “I really didn’t mean it that way.”

“That’s ok. I’m glad to be able to laugh with you.” Vegard loved the sound of Bård's voice when he was laughing and talking at the same time, and he especially appreciated hearing it again, right now. He leaned in and gave Bård what would have to pass for a hug, at least until they got off the ladder. “Alright, do you think you can climb down now?”

“I think so.”

Vegard moved down slightly below Bård and was watchful as they started climbing down . That's when he noticed that there was a lot of blood on the sock of Bård’s shoeless foot. Bård wasn’t complaining about it, but Vegard could see him flinching a little bit more each time he had to put weight on it. “Do you want to rest, Bård?”

They were about halfway down the ladder. “No, I just want to get down.”

“Just stop for a second." Vegard reached up to comfort the injured leg. "Are you ok? Your foot’s hurting isn’t it?” 

“Yes, but I just want to get down.”

Vegard nodded, they couldn’t get off this ladder quickly enough for him either. He stayed close as they continued to climb down and put a hand on the back of Bård’s right foot everytime he had to place it on a new rung, to try to stabilize it.

When Bård finally stepped off the ladder he started to crumble a little. All the tension and fear and exhaustion, just everything, overwhelmed him.

“Bård. Bård, come here.” Vegard turned him around and hugged him tightly. They stayed like that for a long time, Vegard hugging and soothing him, Bård holding on pretty tightly too and just trying to get a hold of his emotions.  
  
“You should sit down and get off that foot.” Vegard wasn't really ready to let Bård go, but he felt like he needed to take care of him. 

Bård was still feeling a little vulnerable. “Why? Where are you going?” 

“I’m not going anywhere. Let’s get off this platform and we can sit on the ground.” He held Bård’s arm and helped him to sit down on the platform.

Vegard finally noticed that Calle was there next to the platform. He hadn’t wanted to interrupt their brotherly embrace, so he waited quietly. “Calle, will you help me get Bård off of here?”

Vegard hopped off the platform and then with Bård’s arms around both their shoulders they lowered him gently to the ground. Calle gave Bård a hug. “I’m so glad you’re ok. That scared the crap out of me.” “Yeah, me too,” replied Bård as he leaned wearily against the platform. It felt good to have the earth directly underneath him.

Calle took off to find the first aid box. Vegard sat down next to Bård, close enough that they were leaning against each other. He knew that they were safe now, but every few seconds he felt the need to look over and verify that Bård was really there. They were both pretty exhausted and it felt good to just sit there quietly.

Calle came back with a blanket and some supplies. He wrapped Bård up in the blanket and then he took a look at Bård’s foot. “Quite a gash you’ve got there.” Bård was looking a little pale and simply nodded. Calle had taken Bård’s sock off and elevated his foot on a few towels. Then he put a gauze pad on the wound and tried to slow down the bleeding by applying pressure.

Vegard felt a little queasy looking at the wound and the blood, so he started talking to Bård. “That was crazy when your foot got stuck,” he said. “Well, the whole thing was pretty crazy.” Bård put his head in his hands. “Bård? What’s wrong?”

Bård had suddenly started sobbing. Vegard pulled him over and tried to comfort him. “I’m sorry. We don’t have to talk about it.”

Vegard thought he heard Bård saying over and over,“I didn’t want to fall. I didn’t want to fall.” But then he realized Bård was saying, “I didn’t want you to fall.” He tried to soothe him. “I’m ok, Bård. We’re both safe now.”

After a while Bård started to calm down and was able to take a few bigger breaths.“I was so afraid you weren’t going to let go of me if the cable snapped. I didn’t want you to fall too.” He started sobbing again. Vegard choked up. “Bård, I couldn’t do that. I wouldn’t have let you go. How could I have lived with that?” Vegard held Bård to comfort him, but honestly, he needed to be close to Bård right now too.

The ambulance sirens were finally within hearing distance.

Bård looked up and saw tears in his brother’s eyes. “Vegard, I’m so sorry about earlier…” he choked out. “I don’t want to fight.”

“I don’t either.” He looked earnestly into Bård’s eyes. “That argument was my fault too. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

“So, we’re good?” asked Bård hopefully. As much as he enjoyed irritating Vegard at times, he hated it when Vegard was actually mad at him.

“Yes, of course. I really didn’t mean the things I said. I hope you can forgive me.”

“Well, maybe you can make it up to me somehow.” Bård made a lopsided smile. “You know," he scrunched up his nose, "save my life or something.”

Vegard exhaled out a little laugh. “I love you. You know that, right?”

Bård bit his lip and nodded, not trusting his voice.

 

* * *

 

After the trip to the hospital, Vegard drove Bård home. Since everyone at Bård’s house was sick, and with Vegard’s assurances that Bård was actually fine, they decided to wait for him at home. Vegard hung around for a while to recount the events with Bård, in a slightly less frightening version for the kids’ sake.

As he was leaving, Vegard gave Bård another hug and said, “Get some rest.”

“I might be in late tomorrow. Don’t start without me.” Bård smiled teasingly.

Vegard rolled his eyes and laughed. “Ok, thanks for the heads up. You weirdo.”


End file.
